Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock
pl:Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock Guitar Hero III is the fourth game and second true sequel in the Guitar Hero series. It is the first game in the series to be developed by Neversoft, as previous Guitar Hero games were created by Harmonix before the series was handed over to Activision and Neversoft. Guitar Hero III was released November 23, 2007 in the European region, November 7, 2007 in Australia and October 28, 2007 in North America. Game History *April 9, 2007: The game is confirmed for Playstation 2, Playstation 3, Xbox 360, and the Wii, and a tentative release date of "Fall 2007" is established. *April 16, 2007: All versions of the game confirmed to have wireless controllers, and online multiplayer and downloadable content is also confirmed. *May 4, 2007: Metal news site The PRP announces the games first band, Queens of the Stone Age. *May 23, 2007: In an interview with Canadian radio station 102.1 The Edge, Velvet Revolver says that two of their songs from their upcoming album will be featured in the game (in the end, three songs would actually appear as downloadable content). Also, Guitar Hero III is officially announced by Activision and RedOctane. The design of the guitar controller, a Gibson Les Paul for next gen systems, and the Kramer for Playstation 2 is stated, but not shown. Eleven songs for the game are announced. *May 30, 2007: IGN reveals the wireless Gibson Les Paul peripheral. *May 31, 2007: IGN reveals two more playable tracks. One of these is a newly-recorded version of "Cult of Personality" by Living Colour, as the master track could not be found. *July 5, 2007: Metal Injection shares new info that famous guitarist Slash will be a playable character in the game. He will be unlocked by beating him in a one-on-one boss competition. *July 9, 2007: Activision announces the full title for the game, Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock. A trailer for the game unveils two more songs slated to appear in the game. *July 25, 2007: Scorehero.com users report four more songs that are to appear. *August 16, 2007: The song "Talk Dirty To Me" by Poison is confirmed by GameSpot. *August 22, 2007: Several European tracks are confirmed. *August 23, 2007: It is announced that a demo of the game (featuring the songs "Even Flow", "Rock You Like a Hurricane", "Hit Me With Your Best Shot", "Lay Down" and "The Metal"), would ship with the new game Tony Hawk's Proving Ground for the Xbox 360, on October 9, 2007. Shortly afterwards, the demo will be released on the Xbox Live Marketplace. Another track is also revealed by Activision. *September 6, 2007- Tom Morello, of Rage Against the Machine fame, is confirmed to be a boss character in the game. Another track is confirmed. *September 11, 2007- The game is announced for PC and Macintosh. Controllers Four of the systems feature wireless controllers. The next gen consoles (PS3, Wii, and X360) all have Gibson Les Paul controllers. The Playstation 2 version features a black Kramer Striker, and the PC/Mac version features a wired Gibson X-plorer. The Wii version is somewhat unique in that the Wiimote must be inserted into the guitar controller, and will utilize the Wiimote's miniature speaker and rumble feature. Gameplay Guitar Hero III retains much of the same gameplay as the previous titles in the series; you still use a specially designed guitar controller to play along with colored gems scrolling down the middle of the screen while the band in the background reflects your performance. There are many small differences, mostly made to how the notes are played. The charts creators get to choose which gems can be HOPO'd to better imitate how the actual guitarist would play the song. This means some gems that would not be HOPOs in previous games can be, and some gems that would be HOPOs aren't. The timing window has been extended, making for generally easier squeezes. The HOPO system has also been changed. Instead of having to press the fret only when the gem comes up, you can now hit the fret at any time before it's played, as long as you are still holding it when the gem falls into the notecatcher. Also, on the there is no option for a Co-op Quick Play (a patch released for the Xbox 360 remedied this). Battle Mode Battle Mode is a prominent new feature. It is a new multiplayer option, and also plays an important part in Career Mode. After a certain encore is finished, a famous guitarist comes out from backstage and challenges you to a guitar duel. Once you accept the challenge, two fretboards appear (one for you, the other for the challenger). During the mode, the two charts alternate solo sections. Certain note sequences are designated as battles notes that give the player power-ups if every note is played without overstrumming. In order to win this mode, you must use the power-ups to make your opponent fail out. There are eight power-ups that can be used, two of which break the opponent's guitar and prevents him from playing until they have performed a task to "fix" their guitar, and three of which make it more difficult to hit notes for a given time. These power-ups are: *Broken Whammy - Forces the opponent to move the whammy bar rapidly until they can play again. It's icon is a wavy line *Broken String - Forces the opponent to press a fret button a couple times until they can hit notes on it again. It's Icon is a pair of scissors *Amp Overload - Makes the notes flash on and off and the fretboard shake. It's icon is a thunderbolt *Double Notes - Adds one gem to all the notes (except 3-note chords). This one takes about a second to activate. It's icon is 2 16th note Icons *Lefty Flip - Reverses the fretboard. It's an upside down smiley face *Difficulty Up - Changes the opponent's chart to the next higher difficulty. Takes a moment or so before its effects kick in. It's icon is a cross *Power-Up Steal - Takes the opponent's power-up, if he has one. If not, the power-up is lost. it's icon is a hand *Death Drain - Quickly lowers the opponent's Rock Meter, no matter how many notes he is hitting. Only used in Sudden Death. It's icon is Skulls with bones If you can beat the boss, you will unlock him as a playable character to buy in the store, and he will play the encore (a song from an artist that boss plays in) along with you. The three boss battles are: *Tom Morello, 2nd tier, guitarist for Rage Against the Machine and Audioslave. He plays Bulls on Parade on his "Arm The Homeless" guitar with you. *Slash, 5th tier, guitarist for Guns N' Roses and Velvet Revolver. He plays Welcome to the Jungle on his 1959 Les Paul with you. *Lou a.k.a. The Devil, 8th tier, manager of the cover band your character plays in. The battle is a rendition of The Devil Went Down To Georgia by Charlie Daniels Band. After you beat him, he falls down a giant crack in the ground, presumably back to Hell. You then play Through the Fire and Flames atop a pillar of amps while the credits roll on the game, along with pictures of the development staff. The difficulty is the same as whaterver the Lou Battle was. No score is kept and you won't fail if you don't play along to the song. In the career setlist, for the boss battles, it is only noted whether you have beaten the boss, and not how many stars you have or your score (as there is no multiplier). Before the free Boss Battle downloadable song pack was released, there was no way to take the charts into Practice mode or play them in single player or co-op. The other songs can be played in a multiplayer version of the mode. Characters Neversoft lead developer Alan Flores revealed that Guitar Hero III has a cast of thirteen characters. Characters returning from previous titles are Johnny Napalm, Judy Nails, Axel Steel, Izzy Sparks, Casey Lynch, Lars Ümlaüt, and Xavier Stone. Midori is an original playable character that can be selected; additionally, each system has two additional playable characters that can be unlocked: the Wii and PS2 versions include the characters of Metalhead and Elroy Budvis, while the 360 and PS3 versions include The God of Rock and The Grim Ripper. In addition, the player can unlock the three boss characters: Tom Morello, Slash, and Lou the Devil, once they have completed their respective boss battles in career mode. While Bret Michaels appears in the game and sings specific songs, he is not a playable character in the game without use of a code. Michaels is only included in the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 versions of the game. Achievements The achievements for the Xbox 360 version of the game have already been announced, and be viewed here Venues *"Backyard Bash" *"Mitch's Moose Lounge" *"Video Shoot" *"Ye Olde Royal Odeon" *"Shanker's Island" *"Desert Rock Tour" *"Kaiju Megadome" *"Lou's Inferno" Setlist For the setlist, please see this article External links *GH3 song suggestion site (project ended as of 12/31/06) *Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock on Wikipedia *Neversoft, developer of Guitar Hero III *Activision, publisher of Guitar Hero III *RedOctane, makers of the Guitar Hero peripherals Category:GamesCategory:Guitar Hero III